Bakery products are delivered to many retail outlets in trays which are loaded onto rails of appropriate route delivery trucks. The trays are loaded onto the route trucks by sliding them onto the rails, either at the bakery itself or at depots. In accordance with the prior art practice, the trays are shipped from the bakery to the depots in large racks which are loaded onto large transport trucks. The trays are supported on rails in the individual racks, and slide along the rails as they are loaded.
For example, bread baked in Los Angeles may be trucked to depots in adjacent communities in large transport trucks. The bread is loaded onto trays which, in turn, are stacked on rails in large racks, the racks being loaded onto the transport trucks. The racks are unloaded at the depots, and they are placed so that the individual route delivery truck drivers can slide the loaded trays out of the racks, and then slide them onto rails in their route tracks for delivery to the local retail outlets. The empty racks, and trays which were used on the previous day, are loaded back on the transport trucks for return to the bakery.
However, the racks referred to in the preceding paragraph weight about 500 pounds, and they are awkward, bulky, hazardous, costly and space-consuming. An important objective of the present invention is to provide a stackable-nestable basket/tray combination container which may be used in a distribution system which retains all the advantages of the prior art distribution system, and yet which eliminates the heavy and costly racks.
Another type of bakery goods distribution system, which does not require the large, heavy racks discussed in the preceding paragraphs, uses nestable/stackable baskets such as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,308,954 and 4,334,616 which issued in the name of the present inventor. The nestable/stackable baskets described in the patents may be loaded with bakery goods at the bakery and stacked on top of one another on appropriate dollies. The stacks of loaded baskets may then be transported to the depots and/or to the retail outlets on appropriate trucks. Upon arrival at the retail markets, the stacks of loaded baskets may be rolled on the dollies to appropriate positions on the floor of the market. The products in the baskets may then be displayed at the various positions and made available for purchase while still in the baskets. When the baskets are empty, they may be nested down into one another for space conservation purposes, and returned to the bakery.
However, the prior art bakery goods distribution system using stackable/nestable baskets lacks the flexibility of the prior art tray distribution system described above. This is because the individual baskets cannot be easily removed from the stack for examination of the products loaded thereon, or in circumstances, for example, when selected baskets only are to be delivered to a particular market. Moreover, the basket distribution system is not adaptable to present-day route trucks which are equipped with rails.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a nestable/stackable basket/tray container combination which enables the bakery products to be distributed in a system which has all the advantages of both the prior art tray and basket distribution systems with none of the disadvantages.
The nestable/stackable basket/tray container combination of the present invention, in the embodiment to be described, comprises a nestable/stackable basket that has a variety of stacking heights to accommodate different height bakery products. The basket has an open bottom and an open front end. The combination also includes a tray which is supported on the lower edges of the sides of the basket, which are bent in for that purpose, and the tray is adapted to be pulled out through the open front of the basket.